Operation Blue Bat

Operation Blue Bat (15 July-25 October 1958) was a military operation of the United States that was launched to stop communist and socialists from taking power in Lebanon as Christian President Camille Chamoun's tenure as president came to an end.

Background
The political situation in the Middle East deteriorated after the 1956 Suez Crisis, which saw Israel, France, and the United Kingdom invade Egypt to defend their interests in the Suez Canal. Gamal Abdel Nasser, the President of Egypt, became a war hero after French, British, and Israeli forces eventually withdrew as a part of the United Nations-brokered peace treaty, and he imposed a communist/socialist dictatorship over Egypt. Lebanon angered Egypt by maintaining diplomatic relationships with the UK and France after the war, and Nasser's moves for Arab nationalism in forming the United Arab Republic of Egypt and Syria led to unrest amongst the Lebanese Muslim population. President Camille Chamoun, a Maronite Christian, refused to join the republic. In 1958, a Muslim rebellion began in Lebanon, led by socialists and communists, and Chamoum complained to the United Nations. Soon, Chamoun called for American assistance.

War
According to his "Eisenhower Doctrine" of promising aid to countries threatened by communist takeovers, US President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent 14,000 US troops from across Europe to Lebanon and they secured the capital city of Beirut so that communist forces could not take over. The Americans negotiated a peace between two sides after 2,000 Lebanese were killed, and the Christian general Fuad Chehab was chosen to succeed President Chamoun once his term ended later that year.